One of the three workers exposed to high doses of radiation in late September in Japan's worst nuclear accident died at 11.21 p.m. Tuesday night, 83 days after the accident. Hisashi Ouchi, 35, had been in a critical condition since Monday and eventually died of heart failure. Ouchi's doctors at the University of Tokyo Hospital said they had raised the oxygen concentration in his respirator to 100 percent after his breathing worsened earlier in the week. They were also barely managing to keep his pulse rate and blood pressure at normal levels through medication. Ouchi, Yutaka Yokoyama, 55, and Masato Shinohara, 40, were exposed to radiation while working in a conversion building at JCO's uranium processing plant in Tokai, Ibaraki Prefecture, on Sept. 30. The accident occurred when the workers sidestepped safe operating procedures and caused a nuclear chain reaction. JCO is wholly owned by Sumitomo Metal Mining Co. Yokoyama, the least injured of the three JCO Co. workers, was discharged from a hospital affiliated with the National Institute of Radiological Sciences in Chiba, Chiba Prefecture, where Shinohara is still being treated. At least 80 other people were exposed to high levels of radiation in the accident.
